Culture

. A Note on Iambic Barktameter I have an Australian Shepard named Sunny who loves poetry. I didn’t believe it at first, but she proved it to me. She showed me her copy of Poetry magazine and said, “Look...

. Bats at Sunset The monster is rotund, vile, enormous, three-muzzled, and barking ---Vasily Trediakovsky, after Virgil The woods are lovely, dark, and deep ---Robert Frost Last night the bats were flying so...

. The Calendar You are the festive dregs of January,you liven February with Valentine’s.You are the March that gives spring sanctuary,you are the splashing rain April confines.You entertain the shaken buds...

. Moments from Dante’s Inferno Prepared to travel, if the gods allowed, I saw the woods were dreary, dark as death. I chose to heed a blessing there endowed, before emerging spirits took a breath. And that...

. Swimming with Dreams and Memory My childhood dreams and memories remain through adulthood and old age. My doll speaks. My toy car surfs that tidal wave, again. I’m still afraid of darkness, and the...

. “Newquay, we have a problem” January 9, 2023 We’ve gathered in thousands to witness the blast-off, We’re sipping Champagne with our eyes full of stars. In five or ten years now, our guys will be...

. Greta's Smorgasbord of Hate I love the pretty trees, the trees love me! They make me dance and sing, they make me shout And sulk and give loud speeches: blah, blah, blah How dare you feed on cow meat and...

. Gloucester in July A thousand silent saints and angels Hewn from vertex, plane, and angle Raised by blow of mason’s hammer Raised from stone to watch the faithful Underneath the sinners stammer Pray and...

. Beatitude Be glad and smile, for they revile, The Truth they mock and put on trial, The Beauty they do not possess, The Good, they curse, and will not bless, For Christ foretold this world’s own bile. Sit...

. El Pescado They gloat: the age of Pisces, it is over. They chant to call Aquarius’ forces in. In the deep labyrinths we sought the sign, The two-stroke fish, walls clammy, glittering. The old Mass book...

. The Christmas Story An angel of the Lord, Came forth with joyful news, Of Him Who is adored, Messiah of the Jews. The angel hailed the one, A Virgin pure and bright, Who chosen for the Son, Would crush the...

. Civilisations Forget the Taste of Their Own Tails To see a friend possessed By the time’s ideological incantations, To see a world soon blessed By mob rule and its dark infatuations; To glimpse a...

. Bingo Ladies Gray-haired gals meet twice a week, Have their luncheon with the clique At the Wendy’s in Coppell. After they have talked a spell Off to northwest part of Dallas To the Giant Bingo...

. Out, out, brief candle! ---Macbeth I am black-dog blue and blinded by the glitzy gaze of stars. Lucent moons will never light __my skyless eye. I am frequently reminded of my fear __of future scars--- when...

. For Sophie Pakaluk Barrows based on The Appalling Strangeness of the Mercy of God by Michael Pakaluk in pie quebrado meter Before God made her soul and mind, Before her parents’ genes entwined __To start...

. On the Banning of the Word 'Field' by the University of Southern California’s School of Social Work See the related news story here. In Southern California they’ve declared that field’s a word to...

. For the French Revolution Oh, this shall tell the tale of France’s past: the revolution brought in ‘eighty nine, when Frenchmen took a stand and rose, amassed, against the king from ocean to the...

. Be Gone an angry teenage daughter to her absconded mother What irritant incited you to leave And not come back while I was left to grieve? Was it the man you wed, the girl you bore, Your dispositions? Tell...

. Letter from a DC Prison We’d seen the evidence, the ballots dropped In loads of boxes trundled in late-night With ballot counting claimed to have been stopped; The windows blocked to hide observers’...

. Antietam It was the bloodbath battle of the Civil War; Scores of men died, by musket, the gore; Was this brave dead soldier from north or from south, Left on the field, blood gushed from his mouth; He had a...

. Queen of Jubilees A Queen there was, revered, of global fame--- Elizabeth the Second was her name. For three-score-years-and-ten she ruled the roost and gave us Brits a self-assuring boost through walkabouts...

. Mourning Louis XVI We must not say in public that we mourn--- Sit still, Brigitte, and listen to your père! If we disclose our grief we court the hate Of France’s revolutionary swarm. These days are bleak...

. The Departing Year This night shall stand and stare with wintry rage Through half-closed windows stained in loss and gain; To measure all astounding feats and fame Against those bitter tears in blinding...

. "I Will Mock When Your Calamity Cometh"  "...but ye have set at nought my counsel, and would hear none of my reproof: I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh..."  ---Proverbs...

. Xi When Xerxes saw his bridge of boats which spanned The Hellespont destroyed, forthwith he laid Fetters of iron on the waves and flayed With whips the surf which had him dared withstand. So Gaius, too,...

. Cambridge Dictionary Women, 2040 In 2040 leftist sports fans Realized their greatest joys, With legendary women’s records Smashed by athletes born as boys. Serena Williams’, Brittney Griner’s Records...

. La Bandera “ never begins an attack, nor, when once engaged, ever surrenders” —Benjamin Franklin It was the feast of the Epiphany. The mall was full, the air alive with flags And musical with...

. The Babylonian Exile At first it cut much quicker to the bone: The loss of all, our world brought to the brink. But by and by you slowly start to think That maybe your concerns were overblown. Their gods are...

. Unholy Orders for defrocked priest Frank Pavone I heard disturbing news: Pope Francis fired a priest For preaching pro-life views To save some of the least, Against unholy orders From bishops from on...

. Shams Shams-i Tabrizi was Rumi’s intimate friend and spiritual mentor. I stayed awake those short midsummer nights When naked druids danced beneath the moon’s Hypnotic glow performing pagan rites And...

. . A Broadside Drawn up before us, proud and sure, Costumed in their haute couture, And sporting all the best coiffures, With colours purple and azure, Loom the powers of disarray, Armed with bromide and...

. The Winter Cold I so despise the winter cold; I admit it makes me utter all kinds of truly nasty words, disposition in the gutter. The snow, the ice, this arctic clime do not set my heart aflutter, and...

. Calendar Poems by Margaret Coats January loves what goblets hold, And February complains of cold. March plows the fields with furrows new, And April nurtures each flower’s hue. Dew on the grass, and leaves...

. New Year’s Resolution a villanelle by David Whippman And what have you resolved for the new year? I guarantee your vows will be in vain. Oh, I don’t doubt that right now you’re sincere. But soon,...

. Same Old New Year   I bid adieu. You shuffle out. A new you shimmies in--- A you without the frown and pout, A happy you of zip and clout, And once again I’ve little doubt You’ll make me rich and...

. Her Silent Prayer  for Isabel Vaughan-Spruce  Beneath the whisper of suburban trees One sombre, sunless, British afternoon, A hushed and humble lady stood at ease In...

. Two Empty Chairs “We did the NFP bit for awhile ... and have felt revulsion over it ever since. During that time we might have had at least two more children.”  ---Letter to the Editor, Seattle...

. “Where Ever-present Joy Knows Naught of Time” ---Dante, Paradiso, Canto X, D.L. Sayers translation a rondeau redouble Where ever-present joy knows naught of time, The music of infinity is sung In...

. Crimes Against My Sanity At any-given-time o’clock While tidying my house, I find--- Oh look---is that another sock? It really isn’t such a shock; My kids for chaos were designed At any-given-time...

. Addiction A ripple imperceptible, like hints of amber in the tiring balsams, swells to waves of apprehension, then imprints a vision on my mind, with carousels of pirouetting bronze bouquets that plead for...